68 TIIE INDIAN ANTIQUARY. [March, 1873.
The present chief of the caste is said to be a
descendant of the persons appointed by the
gods.
There is a belief among the people that if a death occurs in a house on a Tuesday or a Friday, another death will quickly follow, unless a fowl is tied to one comer of the bier which carries the deceased to his long home. This fowl is buried with the deceased. Those castes who do not eat fowl replace it with the bolt of the door. This may account for why a fowl forms a portion of the burial-fee.
The only caste, so far as I can learn, in which the custom of placing a coin in the mouth of the deceased is still practised, is the Vokkaliga; the coin must be a gold one. The body is always buried with the feet to the north.
The word Kulwadi (“he who knows the ryots”) is derived from kula — the technical term by which a ryot cultivating government land is known. In the word Lula we find crystallized a story of other days. One of the Bellala kings, whose devotion to religion had gained him the favour of the gods, had been presented with a phial containing “ Sid-hi rasa,”—a liquid which converted iron into gold. On this the king deter¬ mined to abolish the payment of the land-tax in coin, and ordered that each ryot should pay into the government treasury the “ gula,” or plough-share, used during the year. All the iron thus collected the king turned into gold. In the course of time the initial g has become k, ami from the custom of paying the “ Gula,” the ryot came to be called a “ Kula.”
ON THE SUB-DIVISIONS OF TIIE BRAHMAN. CASTE IN NORTHERN ORISSA.
By JOHN BEAMK!
As a slight contribution to our knowledge of the divisions of caste in India, a subject still involved in much obscurity, the following remarks on the gotras, or families, of the great Brahman caste in th is part of Orissa may be found useful.* Tradiiim relates that the original Brahmans of Orissa were all extinct at the time of the rise of the Ganga Vahsa line of kings, but that 10,000 Brahmans were induced to come from Kanauj and settle in Jajpur, the sacred city on the Baitarani river. The date of this immigra¬ tion is not stated, but the fact is probably his¬ torical, and may have been synchronous with the well-known introduction of Kanauj ia Brahmans into the neighbouring province of Bengal by King Adisura in the tenth century.f When the worship of the idol Jagannath began to be. revived at Puri, the kings of Orissa induced many of the .Jajpur Brahmans to settle round the new temple and conduct the ceremonies. Thus there sprang up a division among the Brahmans ; those who settled in Puri being called the Dakhindtga S'reni} or southern class, and those who regained at Jajpur, the Uttara S'reni, or northern class. Tbs latter spread all over northern Orissa. Many of the southern Brahmans, however, are also found in Balasor; * l• This brief article was put together from notes made at different tim« s ; and something similar was supplied by me to Dr. W. V. Hunter and has been printed by him in the appendix to his work on Orissa. The above article, however, exhibits the classification more fully and clearly than Dr. Hunter’s note, and coi tains some additional facts which l have learnt since the appearance of that work, f The date is not certain. Babu Kajcndralal Mitra fixes i, B.C’.S., M.It.A.S. and the divisions of the two classes are fairly represented in most parts of the district, though the southern class is less numerous than the northern. The former are held in greater esteem for learning and purity of race than the latter. The S'renis are divided, first, according to the Veda, whose ritual they profess to observe, and secondly, into golras or families. I.—Southern Line. 1. Rig-Veda. Gotra. Upadhi. Basishtha. Sarangi. „ Mahapatra. 2. Sdma-Ycda. R asy a pa .................. N an da. Dharagautama Tripathi. Gautama Udgata, vulgo Uta. Parasara Dibedi, vulgo Dube. Kuundinya Tripathi, vulgo Tihari. 3. Yajur- Veda. Bharadwaja— a. Bbaradwaja§ Sarangi. b. Sambhukar Misra. c. Landi Nanda. it at about A.D. 9C4.—Journal Asiatic Society of Bengal, v. 1. XXXIV., p. 139. J This ought to come before the S&tna-Veda, but mjr native informants stick to it that the Satna-Vedis rank above the Yajur-Vedis. I record the fact without uoder- ttauding the reason. § The great Bharadwaj gotra is divided into the three septs here given.
